Fantasy First Times
by raleighlane
Summary: A series of smutty one-shots exploring potential scenarios for the consummation of Booth and Brennan's relationship.
1. As Tony and Roxy

**A/N: I am officially joining the B&B smut community. This is explicit; you have been warned. **

**I don't own Bones.  
**

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**As Tony and Roxy**

He had imagined their first time more than he'd care to admit since the early days of their partnership. It was something he dreamed about, one of his most persistent fantasies; the single most satisfying fantasy. He told himself that this fantasy only seemed more potent because she was the proverbial forbidden fruit. They were Booth and Brennan, cop and scientist, partners in [solving] crime. Their relationship was purely professional.

Tony and Roxy were anything but professional.

Tony was a freewheeling, smooth-talking, ex-army man. And Roxy was the devil's schoolteacher, all sexy fire and naughty schoolteacher charm. Tony and Roxy were nothing like Booth and Brennan. They were together, in every sense of the word, and lacking in all inhibition. Booth knew that it would be dangerous for them to play such a couple; knew how hard it could be to leave an adopted persona at the door, especially when your alter-ego was free to do the very things that you ached for, but he hadn't had much of a choice, and it had felt so damn good to play opposite his partner; to proclaim to the world that this amazing woman was _his_ and his alone, even if it was all just an illusion.

Their first evening as hot high rollers found them in Brennan's hotel suite with Agents Zhang and Sugarman, discussing ways to infiltrate and destroy the group of organized criminals responsible for at least two homicides. After they had talked long into the night, it was easy to fall back into being Booth and Bones. They still sported Tony and Roxy's suspenders and cherry red lipstick (respectively), but the extensive shop talk at the end of the night had them both exhausted and more than well aware of exactly who they were. Booth left that night after a beer (to take the edge off of the pain in his jaw) and a simple goodnight to Brennan.

His dreams were of Brennan or Roxy; it was hard to tell because while she wore the tight black dress and heels that he had chosen for her, she was the Brennan he had come to know and love and trust. In his dreams he had gotten into bed with his sexed-up best friend rather than the stranger who _looked_ like her. The details had faded fast when he woke the next morning, but that distinction seemed important for some reason.

The second night had been vastly different. They had solved the murders, cracked the case as Booth and Brennan, but they had never really dropped their assumed identities. Booth felt Tony's very real boxing injuries, and Brennan acutely felt Roxy's desire to tend to and soothe his pain. They both felt the rush of adrenaline that had come from their night of espionage and danger, and that tide had not ebbed by the time they made it back to the hotel, this time to Booth's much smaller room.

They were both very aware of the one another, hypersensitive to the other presence in the room. Neither was sure who would really break character first and the uncertainty was somewhat nerve wracking. Room service on the bed felt like a date when they didn't talk about anything case-related, or even fall into their regular bickering. And, of course, because Brenan insisted on blowing some of her recent winnings, buying them ridiculously expensive bottles of alcohol- champagne for dinner and scotch for afterwards.

They'd both had more than enough to drink, though they weren't yet to incapable of making coherent decisions.

Booth slung an arm low around Brennan's shoulders. "So what was the other reason you bet on me tonight? Knew that I was just too damn good too lose?"

"You know, it's a very good thing that our undercover operation required you to play someone cocky. I'm not sure you could tone it down even if our lives depended on it."

"Aw, come on Rox. You know you love it."

She'd looked at him then, seeing the mirth and the…lust in his eyes when he called her that. It wasn't the first time she'd recognized that look in his eyes. Nor was it the first time she'd wanted to follow them, see just where that particular path might lead. However, it was the first time that she'd reacted to it with a fire all her own, meeting his bet and raising.

"Wouldn't be with ya if I didn't, _Tony_. So, is there anything more…_exciting_ that this body can do?" She placed a hand on his chest, fire-engine-red nails splayed lightly over one of his many bruises.

He looked like he wanted to protest, to tell her that taking down a man practically twice his size was pretty damned exciting, but defending his ego just wasn't as important as answering the invitation he heard in her voice.

"Pretty sure you wouldn't be with me if there wasn't, Roxy." And then, because he certainly wouldn't fold when she had raised the stakes, he tugged her closer. She could feel his warm breath, still a little ragged from the pain of his bruised ribs, coasting over her cheeks, defining her lips, her chin. "You crave the" his lips finally pressed against the corner of her mouth, soft and warm, "_excitement_" and then his lips were completely covering hers, and she barely had time to register what was happening before his tongue was sliding over her lower lip, demanding entrance into her mouth.

It was a betting game. Neither was willing to give in, to allow the other to call the bluff, but each also unsure of victory. Somewhere, beneath the façades of Tony and Roxy, and through the haze of alcohol, they realized that this had the potential to change everything, and that they were taking a risk, gambling their partnership, perhaps even their careers. But they'd both gambled enough to know that taking these kinds of risks could also reap enormous rewards. And so they went all in.

Their tongues danced together, but soon it wasn't enough for him, and he was nipping at her lower lip and along her jaw, even as he pushed her back on the bed, following her down.

She met him eagerly, straining her neck up toward him when his lips left hers to suck on his own flesh. He tasted like cinnamon and sweat, and she was heady with way every part of him filled her senses. She let out a little gasp as he sucked on the hollow at the base of her throat, and he thought he would go crazy at the way the littlest sound she made had the potential to make him even harder than he already was.

He growled, a feral sound, pulling the straps of her dress from her shoulders to expose the matching bra underneath- a bra which covered very little and really only served to push her breasts up toward him.

But deep down, he wasn't Tony. And Booth wasn't going to take this without at least somehow asking permission. As he tore his eyes away from her beautiful chest, which was pleasantly flushed with desire, to meet her gaze, he opened his mouth to ask if this was really ok, to call her _Bones_ so that she knew just who he was taking to bed. But the question died on his lips when she suddenly sat up, dress pooling around her waist, grabbed the front of his wifebeater and pulled him towards her, blue eyes dark as the desert sky with desire.

"Show me what you've got, Tiger." It was a little cliché, maybe, but he was so far gone that he was pretty sure anything she said at that point would turn him on.

He grabbed the red fabric around her and slipped it out from under her as she raised her hips off of the bed to help the process. "You've got it, babe."

He leaned back on his knees for a moment, just to drink in the sight of her basking, glowing in the light of their sudden heat. Brennan might have been embarrassed, may have covered up. But Roxy was brazen and stretched her long, lithe body under his gaze, trailing her own hands over her contours and smiling when his eyes grew even wider, even darker.

She would only wait so long however, and within a few moments she was kneeling in front of him, soft hair falling gently over the softer skin of her shoulders as she pulled at his belt, button and zipper. He snapped out of his trance when one of her hands caressed him through the fabric of his boxer-briefs. He backed away from her, sliding off the bed and shucking the remainder of his clothing almost before she could even miss him.

He was back with her in a moment, kissing her soundly, pushing his tongue into her mouth to explore just one of the many pieces of his partner that he had yet to know. He took advantage of her upright position to unclasp her bra and pulled back once again to drink in her beauty. The sight of her nipples pebbling from the cool breeze of the fan had him feeling lightheaded; much more intoxicated than the mix of champagne and adrenaline that they had shared earlier.

"God, you're so beautiful," he mumbled to her collarbone, trailing a path of open mouth kisses down the skin there, stopping to swirl his tongue around a nipple as he brushed his thumb insistently against its twin.

He continued his ministrations, and her head fell back at the sensations he was evoking in her, the warmth pooling pleasantly in her belly, the heat and wetness gathering at her core. Her hands twisted in his short hair, eventually pulling his lips back to hers, needing to taste him again, addicted already to his flavor.

Suddenly frustrated as their kiss and the hands roaming her body turned languid and searching rather than hot and hungry, she put one hand against his less-injured shoulder and pushed hard. Under other circumstances he could have kept his balance, but she already had his world spinning in a riot of beauty and warmth and lust. He fell against the pillows, body splayed across the bed from one corner to the other.

Brennan wasted no time in climbing atop him, pausing for a moment to rid herself of the last barrier which existed between them. Giving him a siren's smile, she straddled his hips, gently allowing her weight to rest on his body while she felt his erection pressing into her back. She leaned forward until her nose was just inches from his own, teasing him with her soft breath upon his jaw and feather-light contact between her breasts and his chest.

She began to place hot, open-mouthed kisses on his jaw, down the column of his throat, around his nipple, giving it repeated attention when the sensations made him moan for her. She made her way down the plane of his abdomen, admiring his perfectly toned physique, and before he could quite register what was about to happen, she slid her body backward, further down his legs, as she bent and took his head into her mouth, swirling her tongue around and then over his tip, while grasping his shaft with one hand.

The sound he made was pure need, and though what she was doing was making him see stars, he pulled her back up to him, needing his lips on hers and the reassurance that this wouldn't all be over before it had really begun.

"Need" he kissed her mouth "you" her throat "now" the shell of her ear. He grasped her hips and impaled her upon himself in one smooth motion, both gasping at how elementally _right_ the connection felt.

She began moving over him, her hands braced on either side of his head so as not to aggravate the tender injuries on his chest. His lips attached themselves to anything within his reach, and when she bent down further to explore his mouth while he filled her again and again, he grabbed her hips and began to thrust with her, increasing both the tempo and the depth of their passion.

"Unh so damn good," he gasped out. She simply cried out, a breathy moaning sound that had him wanting even more. Moved a strong hand from her hip to her breast and began to massage it, pinching her nipple slightly. She cried out again.

"Oh" she slammed her body back down to his, "I'm gonna come" she forgot about his injuries, propping herself up on his chest, arching her back and changing the angle just enough so that he was hitting the spot where she needed him most.

With a shuddering gasp, her world flew apart into a million shimmering pieces, like the marquee and neon lights on the Vegas strip outside the window. She was not coherent, not in control of the noises she made or the way she collapsed on him, still moving feebly. It was not of her own volition that she screamed out his name- his _real_ name- when she came.

The force of her orgasm and the fact that she was screaming for him, not Tony, was enough to pull Booth's climax from him, and he shouted her name too- or at least his name for her- _Bones_ echoing over and over again in quiet room while the waved of his climax ebbed and flowed.

When it was over, they lay together, still crookedly, on the comforter. As he drifted off to sleep, Brennan's head resting on his sweaty chest, he knew that tonight there was no question- he would be dreaming about his Bones, because even the sexiest Roxy fantasy didn't hold a candle to the real thing.

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**A/N: What did you think? Should I stick to writing PG-13 fluff? **


	2. In the Rain

**A/N: Hello again! Thanks for all of your lovely reviews. I think I replied to all of them, but I wanted to say thanks for those of you who review anonymously.**

**This chapter is a bit angstier than the last, but it's still smut :) Hope you enjoy! **

**I don't own Bones.  
**

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**In the Rain**

She wasn't sure when compartmentalizing had ceased to be an effective way of dealing with everyday sorrows and stresses. She had been able to box up the emotions she felt while excavating mass graves in Guatemala, Sudan, Rwanda. She'd been able to seal herself away from pain, as one foster family after another abused or abandoned her. Her heart was like limbo: shelf upon shelf of bins, containers full of the bones of old heartaches.

It seemed that maybe somewhere along the line she'd just ran out of boxes; of new places to hide the darkness. In turmoil, she had begun spending time in introspection; started going through those old skeletons, identifying them and putting them away, one by one.

Physically, the locations she chose for these purging sessions had a sort of controlled randomness about them. Not her house or her office- then the darkness would be let out to thrive too close to home. But if she could go sit on the steps of the Lincoln memorial at night or on a park bench at dusk, she could take comfort in the fact that the place was unfamiliar to her, just as she was unfamiliar to it.

She'd been making use of one such spot on an overcast evening after they'd closed a particularly difficult case. The atmosphere of the entire lab had been subdued as everyone felt the strain of a case involving so many children. She'd left the lab and immediately sought out a place to think and had found herself on a bench in a public park.

She'd just begun to really let herself feel, allowing the slightly nauseous feeling to wash over her. She allowed even the tears, when they came, to fall without obstruction, anticipating the relief which she knew would eventually come from the cathartic emotional release. There was no harm in a few tears. No one was around to witness them, and she knew that the physical outflow of emotional release could be rejuvenating.

Brennan's phone rang, a tinny, hollow sound and an incessant buzzing from the pocket of her slacks. Without even thinking about it, she let it go to voicemail. She really wasn't in the right frame of mind to deal with anyone at the moment. The ringing finally stopped, and she sighed, returning to a time and a place far away yet so close to her heart.

Not a minute later, her phone began to ring again. This time she pulled it out in frustration. She sighed when the Booth's name flashed on the tiny screen. Figuring that she'd better answer or he was likely to worry and call in a search party, she sucked in a breath, trying to calm herself before connecting the call.

"Brennan," she answered in the usual manner, hoping that Booth wouldn't pick up on her mood.

"Bones. I picked up some Thai for dinner; want me to bring it by your place?"

"No thanks, Booth. I already ate." She felt a little sting at the taste of her lie, but Booth hadn't picked up on her discomfit yet, so maybe she could get away with the ruse.

There was a pause on the other end of the line. "That's fine," another pause, "but Bones?"

She waited for whatever he was going to say, impatient to get off the phone. When the pause stretched, she prompted him. "Yeah?"

"Is something bothering you?"

Caught. Damnit, the man was just too good at this emotional stuff. She supposed she should be happy about that since it was his expertise with people that made him such a great professional partner for her, but still. It could be inconvenient. And it annoyed her that he was so much better than she could ever be at reading emotions- he could tell that something was bothering her from a brief phone conversation, while she seemed never to pick up on those things, even when they were fairly obvious.

"I'm fine, Booth. Just…just tired." She cringed. _'I'm fine'_ was the best she could come up with? Even she knew that those words were really code for 'I'm damaged and needy right now.'

"Ah." There was another pause. What was _with_ him tonight? Booth was usually a fast talker.

Anxious to get him off the phone, Brennan began to tell him that she needed to go, but he cut her off with his next words.

"I see. You need some time, yeah?"

Brennan considered arguing, considered insisting again that all was well and that she really was just tired. But they both knew that it wasn't true. So she gave him a straight answer instead. "Yeah. I do."

Booth was quiet for a moment, and Brennan almost had the opportunity to convince herself that his silence signaled irritation at her need for time. She began to marshal her arguments against his forthcoming insistence in her divulging information. But she realized she had been mistaken when he next spoke.

"Bones? Do you need time _and_ space?" His reply startled her back to a memory of a moment a few months back when he'd been the one in need of a little time to process some emotions.

She considered her answer. 'Yes!' the rational, totally self-sufficient part of her wanted to cry. She was upset, vulnerable, a veritable mess. She needed space from everyone and everything she knew. But there was another voice there; a voice that turned out to be stronger that evening. It was a voice which had been cultivated by Booth's encouragement and friendship over the past few years. That voice assured her that she didn't need space. At least not from Booth. The combination of his empathy and his strong shoulder could bring welcome solace.

So she answered him the same way he'd answered her those months ago. With a smile in her voice she told him that she _just_ needed some time, and then gave him directions to find her.

He parked his car much closer than she'd managed to (perks of the government plates) and he was able to get to her sooner than she'd realized he'd be able to; before she'd been completely able to stem the flow of her tears. Embarrassed, she wiped at them furiously with the sleeve of her fitted blazer.

Booth sat beside her, not too close, allowing her some space even if she said she didn't need it. He knew her well enough to know that she needed him to give her some room. His right arm relaxed on the bench behind her, and his left pressed a handkerchief into her palm.

He didn't even ask what was wrong, and for a time they simply sat together, two people alone on a park bench in the gathering gloom.

When she started to talk, it was just to tell him cursorily that their case, which had involved both a child victim and a child killer, reminded her of the time she'd spent in Nicaragua. But it seemed that once she'd started talking, it was impossible to stem the flood of words.

Her eyes were glazed; she was looking back on a time and a place, describing it with clinical detail. She related how she had been called to the war-torn nation to identify the remains of what had been an important government official, but had been trapped by soldiers in a tiny village far longer than she had even intended to be in the country. She spoke of living in constant fear and confusion, never sure that her luck would hold; that she'd get out alive.

The rain started to fall, just as, almost poetically, her tears began again. She stared straight ahead, unmoving, as she told Booth about how she couldn't even defend herself when she had gotten into altercations with rebels wanting to hurt her.

"They were _children_, Booth, children. Little boys and even a girl or two, between the ages of seven and thirteen, all trained and brainwashed to kill. They had each witnessed the deaths of their family members- usually by machete- and they had lost touch with humanity. But they were still just kids, and I couldn't fight back."

She took a deep breath and glanced at Booth. His jaw was clenched as he tried to share her pain, imagine her horror. His eyes were shut against the rain which had become almost a deluge, but he had made no move to protect his clothing from the downpour. She looked down at where their hands had become intertwined on her knee at some point. Speaking to those hands, she continued.

"I had witnessed that before, you know. There were kids in the foster system with me- good kids, young kids- who I would see once in a while as we grew up- whenever our ejections from various foster homes coincided. I knew when they'd seen violence. Knew when they'd had to watch a foster father administer one too many beatings. They lost it; they stopped being kids and just started repeating the violence they'd seen.

Booth's thumb was rubbing small, slow circles on the back of her hand, encouraging her to continue. She looked at him with the torture of memories in her eyes and sought the comfort that she seemed always to draw from him. There was strength and determination in his gaze, a commitment to fight against demons and injustices- those she had seen and those she could only imagine.

Maintaining eye contact, she finished softly. "Anthropologically I understand the perpetual cycles of abuse and violence. But Booth-" she used her other hand to swipe her tired eyes, and her voice broke, "I just don't _understand_ it."

He pulled her to him, an arm holding her snug to his side while his cheek pressed down on the top of her head. "No one does, Bones. No one does."

They sat like that for a few minutes in silence, listening to the rain tap against the leaves as it filtered down toward them. Eventually, Booth used the arm wrapped around her shoulders to brush back the clumps of wet hair that were clinging to her cheek. He kissed the crown of her wet head, and when she didn't protest, he did it again.

It was about the fourth or the fifth time that he did it, moving toward her forehead, that she suddenly reached up and captured his lips with hers.

Booth was shocked, too surprised to reciprocate as all of his muscles tensed. This was something he dreamed about- being able to kiss Bones absent an audience and a bribe. She felt wonderful, her lips soft against his, and slightly cool from the time spent exposed to the breeze and the rain. It was exactly what he wanted, but it was also all wrong.

He knew that this wasn't the time, wasn't the place. Not to mention that this most definitely wasn't the way this should be happening. She was hurting, she needed him, and likely, he thought bitterly, that was all it was. He was just a convenient shoulder, a convenient device she could use to lock the pain back away. Perhaps she could take what she needed from this and then go back to the status quo in the morning sunlight. But this had the potential to hurt him so incredibly much. If they fell together now, it wouldn't be just "fulfilling biological urges" for him. It wouldn't heal and help him, it would break his heart.

But he looked at her and saw that there was pain in her eyes which he knew that he could turn to passion...and his decision was made. He knew he'd do anything for her, had already risked his very life more than once to save her own. And tonight what she needed from him was something that would hurt him to give. But give it he would, without thinking about the consequences or the cost. He would deal with the heartache tomorrow.

His decision made, he finally returned her kiss, and she fairly melted into him, pushing her fingers through his short hair and dislodging the tiny water droplets that had settled there. When they pulled apart to drink in both oxygen and each other, he gazed at her for a moment, before pulling her gently up off the bench, tangling her fingers with his, and then leading her to his parked SUV. She followed willingly, recognizing, as he had, that they were still in a public park.

But as he moved to open her door for her, she stopped him, pulling down on the collar of his jacket to bring his lips back to hers. He obliged again, and gasped this time, as she used his moment of surprise to her advantage and slipped her tongue into his mouth. Grabbing her by the hips to steady them both, he twined his tongue with hers, marveling at the way this felt like so much more than just a kiss. All at once it felt like so many things. It was an adventure, an exploration of the unknown. It was infinitely familiar, a homecoming to everything he knew. It was fireworks and heat and heart.

"Booth, I just… I need this. I need you."

He paused to memorize the look in her eyes as she made that declaration, unsure of whether (or when) he'd hear it again. "I know Bones, I'm here for you; I'm with you."

Brennan pushed him back against the wet frame of the vehicle, running her hands up and under his t-shirt. She marveled at the feel of his cool, corded muscles under her touch. He was so solid, such a strong force of nature, and he was always hell-bent on protecting _her_. She didn't usually need (or appreciate) his alpha-male nature, but she did need his shoulder, his understanding, his acceptance of her.

Her light caresses felt fantastic, and when her small palms skated across his nipples, Booth did not try to quell the noise of appreciation that he made, nor did he move to hide his arousal from her. Even the love he felt but never expressed was plain in his eyes. There were no secrets between them tonight.

He returned the favor, sliding his strong, calloused fingers over the skin of her torso, the vertebrae of her back and finally against the sides of her breasts. Booth could just make out rivulets of water sluicing down the column of her neck in the glow of a distant streetlamp as her head fell back on a moan and a gasp at his touch.

The heat coiling in her belly was a familiar element of sexual encounters, but the twinges of emotions for this man and the dizzy erratic racing of her pulse were new to her. Without taking a moment to contemplate why Booth might affect her more deeply than any other man ever had, she impatiently reached for his belt buckle.

His hands stilled their movements across her skin, but he made no move to stop her, and so she didn't, fiddling with his pants until he was bared before her, straining in her hand. She gave him an experimental squeeze and a stroke, but he stopped her there, gently moving her hand aside. She looked up at him questioningly, but he just moved to undo her pants, not bothering with her underwear, instead cupping her hot, wet center through the fabric, flicking a thumb firm across her core.

She twitched at the sensations he evoked, and when her legs threatened to buckle after the third or fourth pass of his thumb, he flipped her so that she was the one against the truck. He continued to rub her as his lips crashed back to hers.

Finally, she turned her head away from his kiss, though his lips just attached themselves to the shell of her ear instead.

"Booth," the breathy sound of his name made his erection twitch. "I'm so clo-" she couldn't finish her thought for the moan that cut off her coherency. She tried again. "Close, Booth, too close." She sucked on his jaw. "Need you with me the first- uuunnh- time."

She pushed her own panties down, and made her meaning clear as she again grabbed him and this time positioned him at her entrance. She didn't need to ask him twice, and as he pushed up and into her, bracing himself with one hand on the truck, he crashed his lips to hers, mirroring his thrusts with strokes from his tongue.

The feeling of the fit had both of them in pure bliss, and it didn't take long before their rhythm and force had increased to a feverish pace. He alternated between caressing her breasts through her shirt and tangling his fingers in her wet hair. She focused on kissing any part of him that she could reach, and when she felt herself tightening, the explosion of pleasure imminent, she spurred him on.

"Booth. So good. I can't…" she gasped, "hold on."

"I know. Shit." He gasped. "Oh God, Bones, I know."

She came with a shudder, tensing and crying out, his kiss only partially muffling her cries of pleasure as he tried to swallow them. He couldn't focus however, and it took only a few more frenzied thrusts before his own shouts joined hers.

Their bodies stilled, and they rested against the vehicle, foreheads touching, eyes closed. The post-coital moment could have held emotional declarations or soothing words. It could have been awkward and uncertain. Before Booth could decide what to do or say, they both heard the unmistakable sound of someone approaching. They looked at each other in horror for a moment before scrambling with their clothes. When the park facilitator came upon them carrying an umbrella and looking puzzled, Booth was shielding Brennan from view, wondering just what the older man had seen (or heard).

"Evening, sir."

"Good evening. Are y'all alright? Locked out of your truck there?"

So he hadn't seen anything. Booth let out a shaky breath and laughed. He wasn't sure that even his FBI badge could get them out of a public indecency charge. "Uh no, we just got um caught up-"

"in the rain and couldn't make it back to the truck before we got soaked." Brennan finished for him, sidestepping him to face the newcomer as well.

"Oh. Alright then. Have a nice night." He waited as Booth opened the door for Brennan and closed it behind her.

Booth moved to get into the driver's side, but paused when the older man spoke again.

"Son? I get the feeling you don't make a habit of this, but you know, this is a public park."

Booth hung his head in shame. "No sir, we don't. And it won't happen again."

"Good." The stranger squinted through the rain at the door behind which Brennan had just disappeared. "Because she looks like a woman who deserves better. Have a nice night." He turned and began walking back in the direction from which he'd come.

"She does," Booth mumbled to himself. "She does."

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**thanks for reading!**


	3. A Show of Faith

A/N: Hello again! I'm not sure how I feel about this one…it may be a little long-winded and/or confusing, but I hope not. I'm trying to vary my writing style in these pieces as sort of an exercise in creative writing. I hope you enjoy this, and I would love to hear from you!

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**A Show of Faith**

It's 10:43 on a Tuesday night, and the Jeffersonian Medico-Legal lab is bustling with more activity than at 10:43 on most mornings. Squints and lab techs are running to hand over test results, racing to find relevant answers because these are not just any particulates, not just an average set of museum-piece bones. They are full of potential; they could be salvation for a young woman kidnapped and held hostage by a crazed killer if these people can only piece this puzzle together in time.

The core team is haggard from the work. They've been running on coffee and adrenaline for 16 hours now, and it's starting to show. Angela's hair is limp and stringy, the product of agitated hands cycling through once glossy locks. Hodgins' brow is permanently furrowed, and he has become snappy, especially at Clarke who, for once, is not commenting about the lab gossip [or lack thereof]. Cam is calm under pressure, a sure product of having seen and been through worse, but she is becoming more heavy-handed with her reminders to _do your job people_ even though those comments are quite unnecessary.

Booth is standing to the side of the platform, out of the way (after being literally _shoved_ there by Cam) and yet he's still not out of their way because he keeps going over witness statements out loud, firing off thoughts and theories at his partner. She may not be the best person to bounce ideas off of, however, since she really has ears only for the bones and the secrets that they can (metaphorically of course) whisper to her.

When Hodgins' head whips away from the microscope in front of him, no one pays him any attention. They are so focused; in fact, that his first _guys I__'__ve got it_ goes unnoticed. But then he swipes his access card and jumps onto the platform waving a computer printout and shouting like a madman.

His voice is loud in the quiet lab as the others have finally hushed to listen to him; results and a theory, the boon of scientific inquiry, echoing in the space of hard surfaces and shiny steel.

One definite result, one course of logic, one theory is certainly better than two in this situation, because if they can be sure then they have a much higher chance at saving the girl. But it seems that results come in pairs tonight, because Hodgins hasn't even finished explaining his evidence before Booth has also had an epiphany. He's talking too, using his hands to animate his words and stepping forward to challenge the scientist.

They're both speaking with speed and urgency, supplicating Brennan to understand them, to believe them, to share in their certainty. When she'd finally slowed them down and sorted them out, she finds that she has two theories about where their killer and his next potential victim are. One location is based upon Hodgins' facts, his logic, his systemic, mathematical data and a reasoning which seems to have taken no leaps and presents itself without holes.

And then there is Booth's theory. It's messy. It's based on things like behavior and psychology and gut instincts. It includes some science, but the science has been used as a springboard for leaps of faith that Brennan and the squints can objectively understand but not qualitatively appreciate.

Brennan blinks, processes, but no matter how she tries to make sense of the two theories, it is clear that they can't be reconciled; that there is one right answer. She doesn't choose between them, not yet; she just grabs Booth's arm and with a _lets go. NOW_, they are jogging together through the lab, eyes of the many squints following their progress set to the cadence of Brennan's heeled boots click-clacking on the lab's linoleum floor.

They're halfway across the parking structure before he asks where they're going; having assumed (perhaps naively) that she had trusted his gut instead of the science. She doesn't answer at first, and he would halt them both to confront her, but there just isn't enough time. He opens his mouth to ask again, but doest get past the _Bones-_ because she shuts him up. _I__'__m thinking, Booth. Hang on._

He wonders when he ceded so much control of the investigative process over to her. He is the FBI agent after all. But he knows that he'll wait for her answer because even though he thinks he's right (feels it, really) he needs her to agree. They're partners, after all, equals here and in everything.

Maybe it doesn't matter what she chooses, because of course they'll call in backup to search the other location. But then, maybe it does because in a hostage situation, in a crisis where lives are literally on the line, Brennan knows that _Booth_ is an invaluable asset. This girl has a better chance at survival if it's Booth _Paladin_ going in after her.

She holds her partner's gaze as she tells him to follow his instincts (they hardly ever lead him astray). He doesn't acknowledge her show of faith in him at the moment; he has other things on his mind; the siren and the traffic and channeling all of his energy toward the task ahead.

They arrive and it's evident that Booth was right. The situation is dangerous, the killer is armed and he has nothing to lose. But the partners have dealt with this before. She's got his back and he has hers and it isn't long before they've accomplished what they've come for; the killer is subdued (unconscious) and the girl is safe. They see one into the back of a squad car and the other into the back of an ambulance and walk away from the scene, his arm around her shoulders which are now sagging from relief and fatigue.

He doesn't even need to ask if she wants to grab food on the way home. They were both way too invested in the case to eat much of anything all day, and now that things like eating have become important again, they find themselves famished. Twenty-five minutes later they are sitting in Booth's living room sharing rice and rolls and curry straight from the cartons. They've been quiet, introspective and focused on their food, but Booth breaks the silence with a question that's been bugging him all night.

"Bones, why did you trust me tonight? Why didn't you insist on following Hodgins' lead? He had more scientific evidence for you."

She doesn't answer right away and it takes him a moment to realize that she doesn't _know_ why she backed him. "You were right, we saved the girl."

He realizes that she's uncomfortable with the thought that she may have done something illogical and he decides to push her further. "I know, and that's what matters of course, but still. Why did you do it?"

"You believed that you were right, and you are the FBI agent."

"True, obviously, but _why_ did you-"

She snaps then, her eyes are flaring and she's furious. "I _don__'__t__ know_, Booth. I don't know. It seems that I let your persuasiveness cloud my judgment. I acted irrationally."

"Whoa, Bones. You didn't do anything wrong. Why are you so upset?"

"We have the highest solved-crime rate in the DC-area field office. We get results because we are a team. I use science, you use…whatever it is you use, and together we come to conclusions and solve murders. I rendered myself useless tonight when I simply agreed with you. Your gut isn't always right, if it were you wouldn't need me. But if I just'"

She's rambling and they both know it. He gets that she feels like she somehow let him down- let _them_ down- by trusting his instincts. He's not sure what to say, but he grabs her hands and turns his body towards hers in an earnest attempt to open himself up to her and make her understand.

"Bones. You didn't do anything wrong tonight. Not a thing. We're partners. We trust each other, and it isn't a crime to have faith in someone. I have faith in you. You have faith in me. Your faith may have saved that girl tonight."

She still looks distraught, and she isn't sure why she says it, because she's never wanted to bring it up before, but the words tumble from her lips, and later she'll recognize them as the most important things she says all night.

"I do have faith in you Booth. I do. And this isn't the first time it's saved me."

That admission from her, well, it's like an unexpected downpour in the desert. Because Brennan just doesn't do the whole admit vague and fuzzy feelings thing. But it feels so good when she does. He doesn't quite understand what she means though, so he presses her as his thumbs work slow and soothing circles over the inside of her wrists.

She looks into those brown eyes, _eyes she trusts_, and tells him a story about being trapped underground. About feeling the urge to cry, to scream, to give up. She tells him that faith (labeled as such by Hodgins) is what saved her. Cool logic, reason and rationality have a tendency to malfunction when confined in a small space and buried under several feet of earth. It was her faith in him, her faith that he would never _ever_ give up that saved them.

He listens in awe, dumbstruck by the magnitude of her words, and for once he doesn't have anything to say in response. It seems that their eloquence and ability to relate feelings for one another is inversely proportional, because he has nothing, _nothing_, to say. But he does have things to show her.

So he tugs on the wrists he's holding, and she leans forward. Their foreheads brush and then, in a few seconds, their noses touch, and then after a few seconds more, they close their eyes in tandem and their lips meet. It is the essence of a slowly smoldering, passionate kiss.

When they come up for air, she takes stock of herself. She _should_ feel terrified. Because this is Booth and he knows her _ohsowell_ and she needs him _ohsomuch_ and if this, whatever it is, should fail, then she will be lost. But maybe faith has made her fearless, (or perhaps she wants him too much to care) because the niggling trepidation she feels is unquestionably small enough to ignore.

The flame of their romance had been meticulously built. Twig of trust upon twig of trust, tepeed up until they were ready for larger things - branches of friendship, humility, forgiveness, strength. It all came together so that things burned with a slow and sure constancy. A single twig could go up in flame, but it wouldn't last, could never sustain. But what they had built- this vast bonfire- could not be put out or shaken down. What they had wasn't spontaneous combustion, wasn't the hot, heady passion that would flare and fade. It was a slow burn, that once set would not die.

And so they set it. His hand, so often guiding her, helping her, and embodying the meaning of all things safe, traverses the material covering the creamy skin of her thighs higher, ever higher in a motion that promises not safety, but the most devilish kind of fun. And her lips, so often correcting him, nagging him, taunting him, move over the curve of his neck, warm wet satin over hard muscle.

They take their time. They learn each other. Tonight the logistics of love, the little awkward moments of newly discovered intimacy are easy and nonthreatening. His hands move from her wrists to her elbows, caressing the skin at the crease, skirting across her triceps to gently massage her shoulder blades. Her hands untuck his shirt and slide beneath, and she revels in the beauty of heat and muscle under cool fingertips.

Their disrobing is not a show, not the main event, but it is not unappreciated either. They take turns undressing each other, moving to explore uncovered skin with the kind of patience that screams _love_ and not _sex_, because these touches aren't doing anything to ease the ache in his groin or the pool of need radiating from her lower abdomen all the way to the tips of her toes.

The longest pause is when he reaches behind her and releases three tiny hooks from their tiny homes and her chest is bared to him. He can only take his eyes away from her beauty because his hands get in the way of his visual feast. He can only tear his hands away from her because his mouth _needs_ to taste her. And when he does, he almost considers kneeling before her in worship, because she has the taste that he identifies as _woman_, but it is so much more than that.

When they are completely undressed, and she has satisfied at least the most cursory of cravings to hold the essence of him in her hand, to create friction and force, to show him the first bursts of blinding pleasure, he grabs her hand in his and turns toward his bedroom. She follows (admiring the angles of his back, the dimples at the base of his spine, and the shapeliest male ass that she has ever had the pleasure of viewing).

They lie down on his bed and make love face to face, taking turns rocking into each other. She's on top when she gets close, and they begin to move faster, because slow does not mean passionless, and gentle does not mean boring. When she does peak, he drives her higher and higher, flipping her underneath him and creating friction between them with his fingertip as he nears and then topples over the edge.

As he strokes her sweaty hair away from her beautiful, flushed and sleepy face, he realizes that there will be questions and concerns about this new place they've found with each other. But they'll manage. Of course they will. Because faith will see them through.

* * *

**Hope you enjoyed!**


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